On March 18, 2026, Ernesto Limia Díaz posted the article below on his Facebook page. Limia Díaz is a historian, writer, member of the National Union of Writers and Artists of Cuba (known as UNEAC, its Spanish-language acronym), and director of the TV program MARCAS. He is also the author of the bilingual book Patria y cultura en Revolución (Homeland and Culture in Revolution).

Last fall, World-Outlook published an interview in three parts with Limia Díaz, ‘Cuba Is the Moral and Political Compass of the World.’

Limia Díaz now provides historical context to the recent revelations by Cuban president Miguel Díaz-Canel Bermudez that Havana is holding talks with the Trump administration after Washington imposed a blockade of petroleum shipments to Cuba and threatened to overthrow the Caribbean nation’s revolutionary government.

We are publishing the article below with the author’s kind permission for the information of our readers. Translation from the Spanish-language original, breakers, photos, and notes are by World-Outlook.

— World-Outlook editors

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‘Do We Talk or Negotiate with the Trump Administration?’

By Ernesto Limia Díaz

The Revolution never refused to talk with the United States, a neighbor that, despite the greatness of Abraham Lincoln^[1] — an example for [José] Martí and Fidel [Castro]^[2] — has been the main adversary of the Cuban nation for more than 200 years.

Despite welcoming Batista’s^[3] henchmen — with blood-stained hands and suitcases full of money stolen from the public treasury; despite the smear campaign against [Cuba] for prosecuting the torturers and pilots who bombed the Sierra Maestra;^[4] and despite Dwight Eisenhower’s^[5] refusal to meet with him, on April 19, 1959, Fidel met with Vice President Richard Nixon^[6] to explain the need to implement agrarian reform and other measures the people were demanding. Fidel knew [Nixon] was the promoter of the coup against Árbenz^[7] in Guatemala in 1954 and the guarantor behind the bloody dictatorships in Latin America, but he needed to avoid confrontation. He didn’t succeed, and we had to face the Bay of Pigs invasion.^[8]

After that aggression was defeated, Operation Mongoose,^[9] designed by the Pentagon and the CIA, turned the sugarcane fields and tobacco farms into flames.

The economic harassment and state terrorism, which fueled the Kennedy administration’s foreign policy of revenge after this failure, was aimed at creating the right internal conditions for a direct invasion; this brought the world to the brink of atomic holocaust in the so-called Cuban Missile Crisis.^[10] Nevertheless, in November 1963, Fidel did not hesitate in receiving the French journalist Jean Daniel, sent by the U.S. president to explore possibilities for dialogue, unaware that in Paris the CIA was preparing Rolando Cubela^[11] to assassinate him.

In 1976, there were exchanges of messages with the Ford Administration that led nowhere, and after the 1977 rise [to the U.S. presidency] of James Carter — years later Fidel described him as a friend with enough serenity and courage to address the issue of bilateral relations — talks were held that led to the opening of interest sections in both countries.

Talks after Ronald Reagan arrived in Oval Office

In 1981, Ronald Reagan arrived in the Oval Office, with a helping hand from the Batista mafia in Florida, and, given his alliance with the Cuban American National Foundation, chaired by Jorge Mas Canosa^[12] — father of Jorge Mas Santos, the owner of Inter Miami^[13] — he included us on the list of countries sponsoring terrorism.

General Alexander Haig, whom Kennedy entrusted with the care of Brigade 2506^[14] after the defeat at the Bay of Pigs and who commanded NATO from 1974 to 1979, promoted the idea of ​​an invasion while he was [U.S.] secretary of state, an idea that resonated in the press as part of [the campaign of] psychological warfare.

On November 23, 1981, with the Mexican government acting as intermediary, Cuban vice president Carlos Rafael Rodríguez met secretly in Mexico City with Haig, who demanded the withdrawal of our teachers from Nicaragua — arguing that they were military advisors; the severing of relations with the USSR; and an end to solidarity with Africa and Latin America.

At Fidel’s instruction, Carlos Rafael demonstrated Cuba’s willingness to provide a list of the 2,759 teachers, including where they lived and taught on the island and where they worked in Nicaragua. Haig refused to listen to reason, dismissing the negotiations with Carter as “delaying tactics” and labeling Cuba a threat to peace, one that was exporting revolution and bloodshed.

How did Carlos Rafael respond? “We are also ready for a confrontation. We know a confrontation would be traumatic for our people. We have no doubt about that. But we are also not afraid of a confrontation. What we fear is an unnecessary confrontation, in which, as a result of errors on both sides, or lack of communication, thousands of Americans and hundreds of thousands of Cubans die. That worries us. […]

“If necessary, I can go to New York any day and organize a different, more detailed meeting. But several of your personal interpretations, which, as you say, are also consistent with the interpretations of the president of the United States, cause me great concern. […] We can and should continue debating all these issues. You say that time is running out. Let’s make the most of it.”

Haig was isolated in the National Security Council when the invasion plan was discussed. The Pentagon and the CIA warned that such an adventure would carry a cost the administration did not need to pay, because Cuba did not constitute a threat to U.S. national security. On the contrary, shortly afterward, at Fidel Castro’s initiative, Cuban intelligence shared information about an assassination plot being prepared against Reagan on U.S. soil.

Negotiations with Clinton, Obama

With William Clinton, after the 1994 exodus,^[15] a migration agreement was reached that was respected by both sides, even when Clinton decided to enact the Helms-Burton Act^[16] in 1996.

During Raúl Castro’s presidency, negotiations with the Barack Obama administration took place for months in absolute secrecy, culminating in the announcement on December 17, 2014, that paved the way for the normalization of bilateral relations and the long-awaited return of our Five Heroes^[17] in exchange for Alan Gross, a CIA contractor caught red-handed in Havana.

International facilitators mediated virtually all of these conversations and negotiations.

Isn’t it strange, then, that under the current circumstances, with a fascist cabinet in the White House headed by an individual with twisted morals, an interest should emerge in seeking an agreement aimed at avoiding armed confrontation? I was among those who believed Trump was lying when he spoke of negotiations — it’s common knowledge he’s a pathological liar — claiming that Cuba was about to surrender to him.

I expressed this opinion both on the Round Table television program and in exchanges I had while in Uruguay March 2-9, where I was asked about it. I don’t feel foolish because our government’s discretion led me to err.

As has been the practice of Cuban diplomacy — rooted in ethical values ​​and respect for those we negotiate with — it is not Cuba that reveals the content of discussions without the prior agreement of all parties. As I already pointed out, such discussions have been held in secret for 67 years, and the pattern has remained the same since Fidel’s time.

Once [Cuba’s] President Miguel Díaz-Canel announced it, the scenario changed. In times of cognitive warfare, underestimating the effects of campaigns in the digital jungle among various segments of the country translates to ceding the initiative to the adversary. The content of the conversations — not “negotiations,” as the U.S. press and anti-Cuban media try to portray them — should not be revealed; but after this disclosure, it is necessary to explain to the people what led to sitting down at a “formal” table with an administration that demands unconditional surrender and interprets any concession as a sign of weakness.

The chaotic way in which the response on social media has unfolded, reflecting the surprise, uncertainty, and concern of our people — fueled by the Trump Administration’s strategy of psychological warfare — shows that the institutions and media outlets in charge of political communication minimize the importance of explaining things to those who, when the time comes, might have to face a military invasion. Without revealing more than is possible, consensus can be built; that’s a lesson Fidel taught us.

The generation that lived through those kinds of discussions for decades has either passed away or is now very elderly. We must explain the history to each generation, and in the face of so many hardships, it is up to us to inspire, persuade, guide, and call to combat for the future of our nation.

I wrote about the events that culminated in the approval of the Platt Amendment^[18] in a series that can be found on La Jiribilla^[19] (online). The constituent assembly members who, under Yankee pressure, changed their vote to approve this ominous amendment to the [Cuban] Constitution that inaugurated the neocolonial Republic in 1902, did so after the doors of the Martí Theater were closed to the people who had previously participated in the sessions. This allowed them to give in. I have no doubt that it would have been impossible for them to do so while Martí and Maceo^[20] were alive; but in the absence of both anti-imperialist leaders, exerting popular pressure became a difficult task.

Talks with Trump administration are necessary

Regarding the talks we are currently holding, in my humble opinion they are necessary because, even in war, adversaries exchange ideas in search of a minimum point of agreement. However, I believe that, knowing that any news related to Cuba generates interest, Trump is creating a smokescreen to deflect pressure from the Epstein case and the disastrous results of his invasion of Iran, which threatens record-high oil prices and a global economic recession. Not to mention that the resistance of the Iranian people is making him look like a fool, to the point that none of the NATO allies have agreed to get involved.^[21]

In an interview with Alma Plus on August 25, 2025, I predicted a [U.S.] surgical strike against Venezuela,^[22] followed by an attack on Iran^[23] — China’s fourth-largest oil supplier — and that, depending on the outcome of that conflict, they would come for Cuba. In a December 17 post on this humble Facebook page, I warned this is inevitable. With sorrow — given the foreseeable consequences of war — I stated in Uruguay that our generation might have to defend the Revolution with weapons.

After hearing the repeated threats in the last 48 hours from Trump and Little Marco — or Big Shoes Marco^[24] — I am certain that if the outcome in the Middle East favors the United States, we will have to fight.

I have no doubt that our government will not compromise on principles, that nothing and no one will be able to bring this nation of runaway slaves to its knees, runaway slaves who took the reins of their destiny into their own hands in 1959. The Centennial Generation did not let the Apostle’s ideals die at the hands of Batista in the year of his centennial.^[25] Our generation will not let Fidel’s ideals die at the hands of the children and grandchildren of Batista’s henchmen in the year of his centennial.^[26]

We are a people who hold justice as the guiding light of our moral world and dignity as the cornerstone of our ethical foundation. And from childhood, from a very young age, we learn from our [national] anthem that “To die for the homeland is to live!”

NOTES

[1] Abraham Lincoln was U.S. president from 1861 to 1865. He is known for having led the Union to victory over the forces of the Confederate States of America, which fought to preserve slavery during the U.S. civil war. In 1863, Lincoln signed the Emancipation Proclamation, declaring that all slaves held within the states that had rebelled were forever free. Lincoln was killed by an assassin’s bullet in 1865.

Fidel Castro was an admirer of Lincoln, writing that Lincoln was devoted “to the just idea that all citizens are born free and equal.”

[2] José Martí, born in Havana in 1853, was a poet and essayist who died in battle in 1895 fighting for Cuba’s independence from Spain. His patriotism and martyrdom made his name a symbol for liberty throughout Latin America. Martí founded the Cuban Revolutionary Party in 1892 and is considered Cuba’s national hero.

Fidel Castro was the central leader of the Cuban revolution. He served as Cuba’s president from 1976 until his retirement in 2008. He died in 2016.

[3] Fulgencio Batista was the U.S-backed dictator in Cuba from 1952 to 1959, when he fled the country as revolutionary forces marched on Havana.

[4] In February 1959, charges were brought against 45 of Batista’s airmen for murder, genocide, and other crimes during some 600 bombing raids over Oriente Province. Initially acquitted by a judge who said that the targets were legitimate since there were revolutionary forces operating in the area, Fidel Castro appealed the decision and 43 of the men were convicted of genocide. The majority were sentenced to 30 years in prison; 9 were sentenced to 20 years; and two were sentenced to two years.

While there were some protests in Cuba about the proceedings, mostly from middle-class elements, the U.S. press campaigned against the revolutionary government for its determination to bring Batista’s henchmen to justice.

[5] Dwight Eisenhower was president of the United States from 1953 to 1961.

[6] Richard Nixon was U.S. vice president at the time. In 1969, he became U.S. president; he was forced to resign in 1974 over the Watergate scandal.

[7] Juan Jacobo Árbenz Guzmán was elected president of Guatemala in 1951; one of his first initiatives was to pursue a broad agrarian reform. In 1952, the United Fruit Company, whose highly profitable business was affected by the softening of exploitative labor practices, began waging a lobbying campaign to persuade the White House to overthrow the Guatemalan government. When Eisenhower became U.S. president in 1953, he authorized the CIA to arm, fund, and train a force to carry out a coup; Arbenz was deposed in June 1954.

[8] Playa Girón (Bay of Pigs) was where counterrevolutionary forces — organized and backed by the U.S. government — landed in an unsuccessful attempt to overthrow the Cuban Revolution in Apil 1961. The Cubans succeeded in crushing the invading forces within three days. Fidel Castro led the forces that crushed the invasion.

[9] Operation Mongoose was an extensive campaign of terrorist attacks against civilians and other covert operations carried out in Cuba by the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA). U.S. president John F. Kennedy authorized it on November 30, 1961. It was a secret program aimed at toppling the Cuban government.

[10] In October 1962, in what is widely known as the Cuban Missile Crisis, Washington pushed the world to the edge of nuclear war by enacting a naval blockade of Cuba and threatening war unless the Soviet Union withdrew nuclear missiles it had installed in Cuba despite the wishes of the Cuban government. The Cuban people and their revolutionary government, with unparalleled determination to defend their sovereignty and their socialist revolution, blocked U.S. plans for a military assault and saved humanity from the consequences of a nuclear holocaust.

[11] Rolando Cubela (1933-2022) participated in the Cuban Revolution as a member of the March 13 Revolutionary Directorate. After the revolution’s triumph in 1959, Cubela became Cuba’s envoy to UNESCO. He was recruited by the CIA and participated in plots to assassinate Fidel Castro. In 1966, Cubela was arrested for such a plot, and sentenced to 25 years in prison. Released in 1979, he went into exile in Spain.

[12] Jorge Lincoln Mas Canosa was a right-wing Cuban American businessman who founded the Cuban American National Foundation.

[13] Inter Miami is a U.S. soccer team in Miami, Florida, that competes in Major League Soccer.

[14] Brigade 2506 was a CIA-sponsored group of Cuban exiles formed in 1960 to attempt the military overthrow of Cuba’s revolutionary government; it carried out the April 17, 1961, landings at the  Bay of Pigs. Alexander Haig — an aide to U.S. Army secretary Cyrus Vance beginning in early 1963 — was assigned “the duty of acting in loco parentis,” he wrote in his biography, to the veterans of the failed invasion. Part of the plan, outlined by Robert Kennedy, brother of then-president John F. Kennedy, was to enlist the Cubans into the U.S. military for training to prepare them for a new covert program against Cuba.

[15] The Mariel boatlift was a mass emigration of over 125,000 Cubans to the United States between April and October 1980, leaving from Cuba’s Mariel Harbor. It was triggered by a combination of economic hardship in Cuba and the decision by Cuba’s revolutionary government, led by Fidel Castro at the time, to allow any citizen who wished to leave to do so. The U.S. government accepted the arriving Cubans and gave them protected status under a special program. Mariel was the largest single migration of Cubans to the United States in history.

[16] U.S. Congress adopted the Helms-Burton Act in 1996. Then U.S. president Bill Clinton signed into law on March 12 of that year. The legislation represented a substantial escalation of Washington’s economic war against the Cuban people.

[17] The Cuban Five — Gerardo Hernández, Ramón Labañino, Antonio Guerrero, Fernando González, and René González — are Cuban revolutionaries who, in the 1990s, accepted assignments from the Cuban government to gather information on the activities of Cuban American counterrevolutionary groups operating in southern Florida. On September 12, 1998, the five were arrested by the FBI. They were framed up and convicted on a variety of charges, which included acting as unregistered agents of the Cuban government and possession of false identity documents. Without a shred of evidence, three were charged with “conspiracy to gather and transmit national defense information.” The Five were reunited on Cuban soil in 2014, when the last of them were finally released from prison. Today, they are considered national heroes in Cuba.

[18] Imposed by U.S. occupation forces in 1901, the Platt Amendment to the Cuban constitution gave the U.S. government the right to intervene in Cuba.

[19] La Jiribilla is a Cuban cultural magazine.

[20] José Antonio Maceo was a leader of the fight for Cuba’s independence from Spain and the end of slavery on the island. In 1878, a group of Cuban rebels signed the Pact of Zanjon, which granted amnesty for insurgents, but failed to grant full independence for Cuba or the immediate abolition of slavery. Maceo, then in command of the independence forces in eastern Cuba, refused to sign during a historic meeting in the town of Baraguá.

[21] On March 14, 2026, U.S. president Donald Trump demanded that governments including those of China, Britain, France, Japan and South Korea send warships to reopen the Strait of Hormuz, a conduit for a fifth of the world’s oil shipments that Tehran has effectively closed since the launching of the U.S.-Israeli war on Iran. The following day Trump warned NATO powers that they faced a “bad future” if they did not help and he threatened to delay a meeting with China. The responses from European countries, Australia, Japan, South Korea and China were, at best, non-committal, with most refusing to being drawn into a broader war.

[22] For more information see U.S. Out of Venezuela! No Blood for Oil!

[23] For more information see End U.S. Bombing of Iran; No Blood for Oil!

[24] The author is referring here to U.S. secretary of state Marco Rubio. “Little Marco” was a derogatory nickname given to him by Trump when they were both vying for the Republican party nomination for U.S. president in 2016. “Big Shoes Marco” is a reference to the apparently ill-fitting shoes that Rubio wears on Trump’s insistence.

[25] In 1953, the centennial of José Martí, Cuban revolutionaries led an assault on the Moncada military barracks in Santiago de Cuba. The assault failed, but while in prison, Fidel Castro and his comrades formed the July 26^th Movement, which led the revolutionary war against the Batista dictatorship and was instrumental in the formation of the revolutionary party that led the country after the defeat of the Batista regime.

[26] The year 2026 marks the centennial of the birth of Fidel Castro.

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